


Upon the Garden

by Thai_Tea_Addict



Category: Original Work
Genre: Blood and Gore, F/F, F/M, Gen, Het and Slash, M/M, Prison, Science Fiction
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-10-09
Updated: 2016-10-09
Packaged: 2018-08-20 12:14:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,577
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8248465
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thai_Tea_Addict/pseuds/Thai_Tea_Addict
Summary: En Kole and his associates have to figure out the mystery behind the radical changes in Prison Container 44-B, running blind into a tangled web of prisoners and human experimentation that will set the stage for humanity’s next evolution.





	1. Prologue

* * *

**_Prologue_ **

* * *

 

_March 2084_

Sept sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose as the small cleaning drone rammed itself into the door of the janitor's closet for the fourth time in a row. It was one of many under his command, but he couldn't figure out why it was malfunctioning on such a level - he'd programmed the entire unit himself, there shouldn't be any errors, and even if there were - it would have affected the whole unit, not just this one drone.

Another metallic clunk as the drone hit the door again pulled Sept's attention back to this current irritation. Perhaps there was just something wrong with this drone in particular, something in its hardware making it hard to translate orders.

Sept blinked, the fuzzy edges in his vision fading away. These silent headaches were starting to increase in frequency; he'd have to make an appointment with the doctor soon. Glancing about, he mused he could ask a coworker - but he didn't really trust the personnel in this particular Hospital. Maybe they'd think he, too, could stand to lose a few pints of blood.

"Excuse me..."

Sept perked up at the voice. Not quite rare, but not quite common - few convicts ever dared to actually enter the hospital seeking help. For the most part, they knew better. Sept turned, taking in the thin frame clothed in the dull white uniform, the long, bedraggled hair that suited this prison's residents. The convict's face was sallow, large brown eyes peering up at Sept with a timid countenance. 

Occasionally, there'd be this sort too. Weak little cowards that couldn't hope to help themselves nor find someone else to rely on, so they'd end up in the administration's hands sooner rather than later. An easy donor, as far as the Hospital staff was concerned; Sept just really didn't want to bother with it at all, at least not while he had this malfunctioning drone still ramming headlong into the closet door.

"I'm busy," Sept said curtly. 

The convict waited there, peering at him. Sept hoped they made the blood withdrawal particularly painful for this one; it was always so creepy, having to interact with the residents of the prison. They always had that same disgustingly lax expression, their resignation to their own death pervading just about every facet of their existence. Locked within these walls, Sept felt he could understand their morbid conclusions - he just wished they could keep it to themselves. It almost felt like a contamination.

"It needs to be reset."

Sept blinked at the tone. It had sounded almost like a candid observation. The fact that the inmate could so casually assess the drone's issue irked Sept.

Sept glared back over at the other, "Look, if you're needing a doctor, then there's one-"

_"Strawberries are best in winter, born in frost and human ash."_

Sept met brown eyes once more, before the world went suddenly monochrome. His limbs lock in place and his mind is static.

"...you need to be reset," the convict muses again, this time with a laugh.


	2. Chapter 2

* * *

_**Chapter 1** _

* * *

_April 2084_

En Kole checked his wristwatch; it was an antique, more for show than anything else and it could even be argued that telling time from such an antiquated face showed an unnecessarily flamboyant quality to his own education. In this day and age, time and date were displayed by numbered stamps across an electronic board; reading the clock's hands was as out of date as interpreting a sun dial.

Time marched on, and though a wristwatch may be obsolete - prisons were not. Their nation's incarceration rate was still one of the highest in the developed world, with more than 60 thousand people serving time for life-long sentences or waiting on death row. As a country, however, they had developed a more useful system for dealing with these convicts who would otherwise be wasting away their lives in the standard prison, useless to society from both inside and out.

Known as 'Containers', these prisons did not take on the appearance of a normal building; they were instead like small towns trapped in a snowglobe. Steel and glass and several layers of the most advanced mechanics kept inmate populations upwards of five thousand people contained; in the interest of the nation, instead of punishing these prisoners - they would make use of them. Container-type prisons thus were given one very specific purpose - donation. Particularly, blood and organ donation.

In the early turn of 2030 A.D., the virus colloquially known as Variant ravaged the world's population. It did not take life - no, instead it altered it. By 2035, a quarter of the world's population were infected and the numbers kept climbing; by 2040, it had started to become less a feared virus and regarded more as the next step in evolution. Variant did not rot away human tissue, nor kill its hosts; it changed them on a molecular level, altering DNA sequencing so that the host became stronger, with faster reflexes and accelerated healing. Most notably, and at first horrifically to the worldwide population - it changed their diet.

People who contracted Variant craved blood. They were sustained by it; similar to the antiquated disease that vampires were based on, but it wasn't just a psychological issue - it became the necessary diet needed to keep them alive. 

The world had reacted as terribly as expected at first, but given time and an increasingly-affected population - the hysteria withered, science taking a step up in analyzing it. What was once terror was replaced by understanding, and that understanding bred a growing market that made blood a commodity.

The U.S. had a Variant population nearing 5 million, and blood donations had already been hard to come by. Companies and schools began to make it mandatory in order to keep that population up, and as the years marched on, people began to want the natural advantages inherent in the virus. A greater need led to a blow up in the market, and this privatized a great deal of the blood supply. Companies needed a large base of human blood at their disposal, steady and without much fuss.

And so they made Containers.

Privatizing prisons was already well underway before the Variant Virus, and with this new incentive - it had all but accelerated it. Containers were the solution to two problems - overpopulation in prisons and a need for a ready supply of blood. Inmates convicted for life sentences or death row, with absolutely no chance of parole, were condemned to the Container prison system. These domed cities housed anywhere between five to tens of thousands, depending on the company that supported them. 

Inmates were kept locked inside, living in a loose societal structure of anarchy. If an inmate was injured, they would be harvested; if they wanted food or drink, they would have to give their own blood; if they acted out of line, they would be harvested. No one much cared what the inmates got up to while locked inside; as long as they were contained and harvested, corporations didn't take much notice of their blood source.

En Kole was in charge of such a blood farm. Technically recognized as a Prison Warden, he'd been enlisted to take control over Container 44-Beta, after the death of its last Warden. Elizabeth Walters had lost her life in a car accident, a boring end to the life of a woman who had ruled over one of the most reclusive Containers.

Container 44-B was considered 'untapped', a unique characteristic among the blood farming system. All Containers sported a sort of unsaid availability to the top class of Variant infected - they could enter the prison and hunt at will. It was a bloodsport at its most basic level; the human desire to hunt now given larger prey. Container 44-B had shared this trait with its peers, but then closed that open-door policy in 2060, keeping their seclusion up until the present. Although blood continued to be harvested from the nearly six thousand inmates locked inside, 44-B no longer allowed anyone to monitor inside.

It was reclusive, and a bit suspicious. It had made Walter's death seem all the more sinister, although no one had been able to find any evidence of foul play. The doubt lingered, especially in light of the murder of Dale Broderick only two months later. The man was thought to be next in line for Walter's position, had positively assumed as such and impressed upon the rest of the employees his upcoming position. That was put to an abrupt end when he was found dead in the office lobby, the 52-year-old's heart apparently refusing to beat any longer.

Two deaths, innocuous in all ways except that they shared the same career and workplace. The company that funded 44-B had decided to forego elevating the current prison chief, wary of some conspiracy and not wanting the same old song and dance of seclusion. So instead En Kole was pushed to take over the vacant position, joining a crew that had served together for years as far as he knew, with only his lieutenant as green-blooded as he himself.

The first month or so had been hectic; he'd been trying to meet and greet with all his new employees. Although 44-B was once of the smaller Containers, the administration crew alone was about 200 people. This didn't include the Hospital staff, or even the service crew that handled the maintenance of the prison or the drones. Not to mention navigating the office politics that he'd been thrust into; the current prison chief, Sai Glyzinien, had been the newcomer before En himself - only having been inducted into the crew for three years. 

The reception had been chilly. Whatever Glyzinien thought of him, he kept to himself and only afforded his attention when absolutely required; although he was never openly hostile, he would hold himself aloof and watch En walk among their personnel with cold eyes. The staff that worked under him were much more warm in comparison; responsible for the surveillance drones that monitored the prisoners and made sure everything was running smoothly within the container, the small army of 150 were both good at their jobs and willing to answer any questions En posed.

Upon seeing the interior of Container 44-B, En had a lot of questions. For the most part, Containers were built around an already existing structure; a small, abandoned town or a desolate oil rig that had run dry. Container 44-B was of the former; a ghost town that hadn't seen a soul for years found itself as the starting point for a Container prison, its already outdated architecture pulled about and rebuilt anew. A town of metal and wood was crafted, shoddy structures that only guaranteed they would stand for years rather than offer any aesthetic appeal or comfort. Just like livestock farmers, Containers only provided a food source; as long as the livestock provided that food source, their comfort could be neglected. 

This made the interior of 44-B the greatest shock to En. The drab, gray-on-white colors that so often marked the interior of Container prisons was swallowed up in an expansive sea of flowers. Buildings were cloaked in tangles of vines, sidewalks and windows and all matter of free space were cloaked in flora - roses, marigolds, chrysanthemums; Hollygrove draped across doorways, tulips and daisies sprung up from windowsills, ivy vines stretched across the faces of buildings, purples, reds, whites, yellows, oranges, and blues spotted the entirety of the prison in startling displays of beauty.

It looked more like someone had built a town under a botanical garden. The only thing missing were trees, but En reasoned that was likely because the roots would cause damage to the service tunnels that ran underneath the prison. 

According to Glyzinien, the abundance of flowers was the result of a project Walters had put into motion a couple years ago, called the Garden Initiative. She had wanted to see if the inmates would take to gardening as a sort of extracurricular; this would both beautify the prison and keep the inmate population occupied. Beautifying the prison had been the real motive, according to Glyzinien; Walters was attempting to make 44-B the premier Container for bloodsport. The aesthetic appeal of flowers would add to the charm of the environment.

En could understand that, but he was more surprised that the inmates had apparently taken to gardening extraordinarily well. The administration had seen how they handled the first few stages of the initiative, and started to increase the variations in plants; so not only were flowers being grown, they had started to develop crops as well - there was a rice farm situated in the manmade lake to the southeastern side of the prison, and Glyzinien had even mentioned giving them staple crops like potatoes and tomatoes to see if they could farm them as well.

The Garden Initiative had yielded such positive results, it seemed the blood from this particular inmate population was actually the healthiest on the market. Often, inmates in Container prisons would suffer some health issues due to their strained diet; for the most part, they were kept on a cheap regimen of high energy biscuits and water to sustain themselves. This strict diet caused a variety of health defects, not limited to anemia - and the resulting depression of eating teh same dry thing day in and day out also tended to result in a higher suicide rate. In 44-B, they managed to mix their daily intake of HEBs with edible flowers or even crops, resulting in more variations in diet. The added exercise of actually gardening could keep them active, and the general atmosphere of the prison was far more upbeat than other Containers.

"I'm surprised they don't play them classical music and offer them free massages," Belladonna had muttered, looking over the notes of the Garden Initiative. "Such a blatant display of revitalizing a crop. How can they stand it?"

Since all these arguable improvements were for the sake of a higher market value, En didn't see a reason to make any immediate changes. Besides, looking upon a flower garden everyday would be infinitely better than staring at the drab walls of other prisons, a sentiment his newly-attained personnel seemed to share. 

However, the oddities in 44-B only seemed to add on to the already contentious issues surrounding it; there were still two administrators dead, no evidence of any foul play but too coincidental to be a mistake, and now a prison interior that matched no on the face of the earth. 

He could ask all the questions he'd like of his employees, but their years of working on this prison in particular granted them an edge he wasn't comfortable with them having, and the files upon files that the previous Warden had yielded absolutely nothing substantial about the prison was run day-to-day. There were only ever records of maintenance, and the drones that surveyed under the employees kept their videos only for a month before they were wiped. 

The only thing En could glean from his employees' written reports and the surveillance feed was that the inmates of 44-B weren't nearly as chaotic or destructive compared to other Container prisons. The records from ten years ago indicated that they had faced the same high turnover rate and rampant violence that so often characterized the anarchic Container prison system, but that they had calmed considerably in the recent years. Glyzinien had attributed that to the Garden Initiative; En did not buy that in the least. It would take a lot more than growing pretty flowers to stamp down on the human impulse for violence.

So now, En had two dead administrators, a Container prison unlike anything he'd ever seen, and no viable evidence anything was amiss. Thus En used what power his new position gave him - to start an investigation into the prison itself. 

It was a rarely used method, usually frowned upon by the brass and a sore irritation to the employees. The sponsoring company for 44-B wanted a full report on everything that Walters and Broderick had never shared, and En couldn't deliver that report with the scarcity of in-depth reports on the inmate population. 

Undercover Corps - a private company that specialized in investigation services. They had been used before to investigate the inner workings of prisons, so this type of case wouldn't be anything new to them, with the possible exception of the abundance of flora. The scale of the investigation, however, would need quite a bit more manpower than they were used to sending in for cases.

They had agreed to send in three teams, on En's request. He'd needed the variety in order to worm them into the actual system, instead of leaving them as outliers to the population. He was finally meeting his three teams today, in order to brief them on the situation and the purpose of their investigation. 

The meeting room En had them waiting in was tiered, easily accommodating the twelve undercover corps sent in. By the time En entered with Glyzinien on his heels, Belladonna was standing at the front of the room looking over her notes, the layout of the prison projected on the wall behind her. All twelve corps were seated among the tiered tables, watching them enter quietly.

"Let's get started," En said. Greeting them was pointless; they were there for business, and the sooner it was done, the more time they would have to prepare. "This is a long-term investigation, necessitating the need for a deep-level of infiltration in sub-standard living conditions. Everyone in this room has already agreed to these terms."

The level of infiltration required to assess the prison system was one that would take months, possibly even years; the corps wouldn't be required to spend all their time in the prison, but they would have to navigate ways to disappear at times for well-earned breaks outside. Gaining that level of trust from any of the inmates would take a long while, which was why En had made sure to include that in the request. 

"You will be separated into three teams, although some level of independence is needed for each of you in case the others don't make the same headway. The purpose of this investigation is to assess and evaluate the inmate population - how they are organized, how they maintain they current population and coordinate with each other, and to see if they have any connection to the deaths of Elizabeth Walters and Dale Broderick."

Glyzinien made a choked noise from behind him but En ignored it.

"I thought Walters was a car accident, and Broderick a heart attack?" a man spoke up after receiving a nod from En.

"Yes, those are the coroner's findings. We just want to be sure and look into any possible connection this prison may have," En replied. He didn't dare look back at Glyzinien - he could feel the burn from the man's stare on his head already. "Does everybody have a copy of the prison layout and its distinctions?"

There was a general murmur of agreement, as all twelve sifted through their given folder. "As can be picked up by our surveillance, the prison population have organized themselves into six distinct areas. The Hospital and the Lake are considered to be under the Administration, so aside from the rice farm they have in the northernmost part of the lake, few inmates venture into these areas.

"One of the most populated parts of the prison is known as the Greenhouse District," En started. On the screen behind him, a picture of a large domed greenhouse appeared, surrounded by fields of flowers. "This 'district' seems to be the one at the center for the popular movement of the Garden Initiative, using the greenhouse left behind from the original town architecture to further develop their gardening efforts. Interestingly, despite the lower population of female inmates - most of them end up within this district."

Out of the 5,580 inmates currently listed as active in the Container, only a bit upwards of a thousand were women. By checking where these female inmates most often used ports - the only records Containers used to determine population - they found the most concentrated use was in the Greenhouse District. According to the surveillance drones that scoped out the area, the women also worked in the fields and within the greenhouse itself, focusing mostly on cultivation. 

"We aren't sure if women are the only ones approved to work within this District, but it seems likely. Infiltration of the Greenhouse District will be the responsibility of Alpha Corps," En said, nodding to the three-person team of women situated in the middle rows. "I want to figure out how they're organizing their people and sustaining their plants; by all estimates, they should not have such hearty growth."

"The remaining three districts will be split between the Beta and Charlie Corps. Of particular interest is the Game District; this area lends itself to leisure activities such as gambling parlors and prostitution houses. Although we have no actual confirmation as such, we also believe it may head a human remains ring."

"What would they do with human remains?" one of the Charlie Corps members asked, mildly disgusted.

"Colloquially, the inmates refer to it as the Dirty Meat Market," Glyzinien spoke up in the space of En's hesitation. "The only access to meat prisoners have are through Special boxes that are only dropped every now and then, and even then it  may not be food. We think the inmates may be killing and eating each other, or selling human flesh to make up for the lack of actual meat products."

"The Game District boasts a lot of power and access to resources," En said. "So they might be using human remains as a way to fund their projects. The same holds true of what's known as the tea House District; they are the center of commerce of the prison. Inmates will trade and barter within this district, and it's most well-known among them for their ability to produce flower teas."

The Garden Initiative had included tea plants as well. The extensive access the Tea House District had to both tea leaves and flowers, however, was another point of suspicion; they should not have enough resources to actually make it a marketable item, particularly to a thousand-fold population. The fact that they did was alarming.

"The Church District is the last distinction, although no less worrying," En continued. "It's the smallest District in the prison, with the smallest population - but it is quiet. They offer a multitude of services for all the different religions, and have even been seen adding to the already established structures present; but violence is rare within this District. We need to know how the inmates have maintained such rigid control."

"Is it possible the inmates just don't want to disturb centers of religious activity?" one of the Beta Corps asked.

"It is possible," Belladonna allowed. "But our records from five years ago indicate that this is a new phenomenon. Inmates had been just as likely to destroy centers of opposing religions, a trend prevalent in all other Containers; this makes the current tranquility too suspicious to ignore."

To En, the Church District seemed ominous; unless an inmate had a particular destination in mind, the walkways tended to be void of people. They had also acquired candles, of all things; anything that could light fires was naturally prohibited in the prison, and although En had never seen any lit - there was evidence that the candles had been. How they got the candles in the first place was still mystifying; Glyzinien had mentioned that small quantities sulfuric acid was sometimes given to the inmates, and perhaps the inmates had somehow figured a way out to make candles themselves. 

"I've never seen a Container like this," the leader of the Beta Corps observed. 

"The previous Warden wanted to take Containers in a different direction from their traditional route," Glyzinien stated. "This prison is the result of that experimentation. Although the set up may seem strange, we actually have reduced the level of violence and improved the marketable quality of blood."

That was all true. En just wanted to know what the costs were off Walters' improvements; the numbers could all be packaged together nicely for the sponsors, but En needed to know how this entire show was running so smoothly. 

"Beta and Charlie Corps will be sent in with the next arrival of incoming inmates," En said. "Alpha Corps, you will be directly inserted. Three female inmates were killed within the first week of their arrival last month; you can take their place, this way having some knowledge on the inner workings of the prison will not seem too odd to those you encounter." Given the highly-structured organization of the Greenhouse District, En didn't want to risk them not being taken in because they were considered too new to the prison. 

"Beta and Charlie Corps are asked to be ready for their mission by the start of the next month," Belladonna spoke up. "Alpha Corps - you have two weeks to get your affairs in order."

Another general murmur of agreement; the Charlie Corps, a five-member team, were talking quietly among each other. The Alpha Corps were rising, heading for Belladonna to ask more questions on their assignment, recognizing the dismissal for what it was. The Beta Corps, a four-member team that was easily the quietest in the room, were reading through the information packet studiously.

En considered the teams. The most prevalent issue with the Undercover Corps for this particular mission was that they boasted a mixed group - both normal humans and those of the Variant. Normally, this wouldn't be an issue; for an infiltration mission into a Container, though, a Variant-infected was rarely ever placed. It wasn't exactly rare for one to be pushed into a Container, given that they were the standard prisons for lifetime felons and death row convicts; but the matter of their 'barter' complicated the prison system.

Inmates offered blood in exchange for any services provided by the Administration. Food, water, soap, amenities - blood was the currency these goods were given for. A Variant could not take the blood of another Variant, however, making them virtually useless to the Container system. The only solution Containers had been able to find were to give Variant inmates a passcode, so that they would be afforded the same basic amenities without the cost. Given the relatively low population of Variant-infected in prison, and lack of viable alternatives - the Variant essentially lived freely within the Container.

Some inmates, however, would be infuriated by this; Variant inmates were sometimes killed by a large group of their human neighbors, out of envy for not paying the same price. The Undercover Corps seemed to hope that the added promise of strength provided by a Variant would gain them quicker access into the higher ranks of the prison; this was the reason they had sent so many Variant for the investigation. The Alpha and Charlie Corps were both mixed teams; the Beta Corps were solely Variant. 

"So," Glyzinien began evenly, out of earshot from the others in the room. "Does my being alive make me suspicious as well?"

En cast him a look, quirking up a smile at the other man's glacial tone. "Don't worry - even dead, you'd still be suspicious."


End file.
